It wastes its environmental and economic returns.. Iraq pays a heavy price by landfilling waste

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[size=52]It wastes its environmental and economic returns.. Iraq pays a heavy price by landfilling waste[/size]

[size=45]The average waste generated by each individual in Iraq is 1.5 kg per day, while the total waste will reach 21 million tons during 2023 with a population of 43.3 million people.[/size]
[size=45]Iraq has another problem added to its list of problems, as many citizens appealed to the Iraqi government to invest in the huge amount of tons of waste that accumulates in the streets and alleys.[/size]
[size=45]Every day, tons of waste are subjected to random landfilling, especially in the capital, Baghdad, where a large portion of it, estimated at about 30 thousand tons of solid waste daily and medical waste, is buried, which exposes citizens to harm, environmental pollutants, and multiple diseases.[/size]
[size=45]As for the governorates of Iraq, they suffer from allocating large areas in most of their regions to landfilling waste. Many residents burn it to get rid of it and the unpleasant odors emanating from it, which causes toxic fumes to rise in those areas, and thus the population is exposed to suffocation. This prompted many of them to file complaints with the Ministry of Environment to demand that they be freed from polluted dumpsites.[/size]
[size=45]Rotational development[/size]
[size=45]As an ill-considered result, Iraq pays a heavy price on the environmental, health, and even economic levels for its inability to deal with this issue, as it contents itself with burying and burning this waste in an ill-considered manner instead of recycling or selling it.[/size]
[size=45]Directives from the Prime Minister to the Ministry of Environment regarding the preparation of a new law for waste recycling in the country, which includes recycling and sorting it scientifically to keep pace with the development implemented by many international countries to invest in this waste.[/size]
[size=45]The Ministry of Environment, in turn, previously announced its orientations towards working with renewable energy sources, emphasizing the recycling of waste, selling it or benefiting from it in the fields of energy, and producing organic fertilizers by ending the phenomena of waste quarries and unhealthy landfilling.[/size]
[size=45]Correct investment[/size]
[size=45]The Ministry of Electricity is also trying to benefit from waste recycling to produce energy, and has studied a number of technical and commercial offers submitted regarding benefiting from the waste recycling mechanism to produce electricity, with the aim of establishing investment stations in this regard, which take into account the purchase of the quantity and value of energy, its tariff, specifications, and rates.[/size]
[size=45]Environmental experts welcomed these trends aimed at confronting the increasing frequency of the repercussions of environmental degradation and climate change in Iraq, by diversifying clean energy sources and investing in waste and debris in productive scientific ways, such as recycling, in a way that contributes to addressing this pressing issue.[/size]
[size=45]Culture and gain[/size]
[size=45]Economic expert Saleh Al-Hamashi confirmed in his interview with (Al-Mada), that “the waste that is buried in these sites and in this quantity is a national wealth in itself, and contains raw materials that are used in the industry through recycling, but Iraq does not have waste recycling plants, and despite There is talk about building these laboratories, and the foundations of one of the laboratories in the Mahmoudiyah area, but the Baghdad Municipality has not completed it yet.”[/size]
[size=45]Al-Hamashi adds, “Most of the materials that had to be recycled and utilized are smuggled out of the country, such as iron, copper, aluminum, and paper, in large quantities to be sold to Iran and Turkey, as exports of raw materials to Turkey alone amounted to about 900 million dollars during the year 2022, some of which included Waste exports, so the Municipality of the Capital had to establish a waste recycling and treatment plant in every city, and this will provide a very large financial return for the state.”[/size]
[size=45]Citizen health and wealth[/size]
[size=45]The economic expert continues and says: There are many countries that distribute colored waste bags to their citizens, in order to divide the waste according to its materials, and when the citizen achieves the sorting process correctly, he is exempted from cleaning fees and some privileges, and then specialized companies collect this waste, so we see Many countries import waste from other countries, and this confirms to us that this waste is real wealth.”[/size]
[size=45]Al-Hamashi concludes his speech by saying, “There is another important aspect to this issue, which is that the presence of waste poses an environmental danger to human health, which makes the state pass through a crossroads, which is either obtaining two gains or running into two problems, which are the health of the citizen and wealth. However, Iraq has not benefited for decades.” Of this wealth, in addition to the sanitary landfill areas within the capital, Baghdad, and burning waste is not a healthy method used by the Baghdad Municipality, and the competent authorities must work hard to clean the cities and invest raw materials in the waste, in addition to the fact that there is industrial waste that can be invested in the correct ways.”[/size]
[size=45]Zero waste[/size]
[size=45]The Strategic Center for Human Rights in Iraq warned of the presence of major pollutants in the country, as it confirmed in a statement received by Al-Mada that “plastic pollution threatens the lives of citizens and the environment in Iraq, and also directly affects biological diversity.”[/size]
[size=45]He added: “Countries in the East Asia and Pacific region disposed of 686 million metric tons of plastic waste in 2023, or about 31 percent of the world’s waste.”[/size]
[size=45]He continued, "Without major changes in Iraq's environmental policy on a large scale, the rate at which plastic enters daily living environments in Iraq will increase by about 2.6 times from 2022 to 2040, which portends a major plastic pollution disaster."[/size]
[size=45]Governmental authorities indicated that the capital, Baghdad, buries about 10,000 tons of waste daily, and that the need to treat this waste requires the implementation of the environmentally friendly “Zero Waste” project, and thus a good economic return will be achieved through the project, in addition to providing many job opportunities.[/size]
[size=45]It is noteworthy that the Baghdad Municipality had previously confirmed the intention to establish two factories to burn waste and invest it in generating electrical energy.[/size]
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